Finland to join air force exercise with US, Sweden

Finnish president Sauli Niinisto announced on Friday that Finland has accepted a U.S. invitation to join an air force exercise in the Baltic Sea area in March, media reports said.

However, the training exercise will take place either in the international airspace or in Finnish or Swedish airspace, but not in Estonian airspace as earlier speculated.

The exercise is expected to last three weeks and Finland will be participating during the first two weeks, the president was quoted by Finnish national broadcaster Yle as saying.

The U.S. embassy in Finland earlier said the U.S. air force planned to launch a bilateral U.S.-Estonia training exercise and to invite neighboring Finland and Sweden to join.

Estonia has no jet fighter capability of its own, but U.S. president Barack Obama has expressed willingness to increase U.S. military presence in the country and the Amari air base in Estonia seems an ideal location to host U.S. aircraft.

Yle reported that the Finnish foreign policy leadership had been split on the issue. Niinisto and Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja were uncertain as to whether Finland should take part, while Prime Minister Alexander Stubb and Defense Minister Carl Haglund were in favor.

The decision to accept the invitation was taken on Friday morning at a joint foreign policy and defense policy meeting, said Yle.

According to the broadcaster, the president said "he did not know what the attitude of Russia was" towards Finnish participation in the coming exercise. Endit